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Lakhimpur Kheri: The violence, the aftermath and the politics
What happened roughly 10 km south of the river Mohana in Tikunia on the afternoon of Sunday, October 3, put the district on the national map — albeit for the wrong reasons
Lucknow: Lakhimpur Kheri, the largest district in Uttar Pradesh (UP), was once a nondescript town, mostly popular among wildlife enthusiasts and tourists because of its tigers and other wildlife. The Dudhwa National Park is located in the district, and the only news that this specific geography made — until now — was about man-animal conflict. Lakhimpur Kheri was also known as the sugar bowl of UP, with rich sugarcane farming and nine sugar mills.
The district is in the Terai lowlands at the base of the Himalayas, with several rivers and lush green vegetation. Lakhimpur Kheri is bound on the north by the river Mohana, separating it from Nepal. It is 141 km from Lucknow, and Tikunia is 215 km from the state capital.
What happened roughly 10 km south of the river Mohana in Tikunia on the afternoon of Sunday, October 3, put the district on the national map — albeit for the wrong reasons. On that fateful afternoon, in a bloody and horrific incident, eight people died: Four farmers, a journalist, two local Bhartiya Janata Party (BJP) workers, and a driver.
Within hours of the incident, photos of angry farmers around two SUVs in flames appeared on television screens across the country.
Lakhimpur Kheri hit headlines like never before.
What happened in Tikunia
The violence in Tikunia began after an SUV — leading a cavalcade of three vehicles — rammed into protesting farmers on the Tikunia road at 2:30 pm on October 3. The Tikunia road leads to Lakhimpur Kheri.
Earlier in the day, thousands of farmers from Lakhimpur Kheri and nearby districts gathered in Tikunia to mark their protest against three new farm laws passed in Parliament last year in front of UP’s deputy chief minister (CM) Keshav Prasad Maurya.
Maurya was supposed to land on a makeshift helipad and then travel to a nearby venue to inaugurate a wrestling tournament that was organised by the BJP Member of Parliament (MP) and MoS for home, Ajay Mishra “Teni”. His son, Ashish Mishra, was managing the event. Three SUVs, filled with Teni’s supporters, reached the venue to welcome Maurya.
The protesting farmers, however, blocked the makeshift helipad, forcing the administration to cancel the plan of the deputy CM arriving in Tikunia. Just half an hour after the visit was cancelled, the SUVs, on their way back, rammed into the farmers. The farmers say that the SUVs were unprovoked, but local BJP supporters said that farmers were pelting stones at the passing vehicles, which threw them out of control. Farmers also allege that Ashish Mishra was in the SUV leading the cavalcade that hit farmers.
Harpreet Singh, a 28-year-old farmer, said: “I was standing on the roof of a house on the road along with at least 20 others and saw the carnage unfold.”
He added: “The road was packed with farmers who were returning from the venue. They were stopping to take photographs and selfies, which slowed the movement and led to further crowding on the road. Meanwhile, I saw three cars leaving the playground. The SUV leading the pack began accelerating, and some farmers had a close shave, with the vehicle nearly hitting them.” The videos that later surfaced showed the vehicles hit them from behind.
Singh, describing the incident, added, “This SUV kept speeding till it reached the spot where farmers had assembled. I saw it plough into the crowd from behind. To save themselves, farmers jumped into ditches on both sides of the road. It appeared like a tractor moving through a paddy field, crushing plants, and leaving tyre marks behind. People started shouting. I couldn’t believe my eyes.”
While several farmers were soaked in blood, they yelled and cried as the angry crowd forced both the first and second SUV to stop, and attacked their occupants. One driver and two BJP workers were killed. Other occupants of the SUVs managed to flee.
Within an hour of the incident, Bharatiya Kisan Union (BKU) leader Rakesh Tikait, who was at Ghazipur (Ghaziabad) tweeted about the incident, and headed straight to Lakhimpur Kheri. While the provincial armed constabulary (PAC) and the local police rushed to the spot immediately, CM Yogi Adityanath rushed with the additional director-general of police, law and order (ADG-LO), Prashant Kumar, to the spot. No further violence occurred.
Of talks, negotiations, and FIRs
A high-powered committee headed by the additional chief secretary, Devesh Chaturvedi and ADG-LO, Kumar, rushed to Tikunia a few hours after the incident to broker a deal with protesting farmers, as farmers had announced that they would not cremate the bodies till justice was done.
The officials tried to establish talks with the farmers and urged them to call off the protest on Sunday night, but the talks failed. The next morning, the farmers appointed BKU and Sanyukt Kishan Morcha leader, Tikiat, as a negotiator from their side.
The officials camped in a nearby school. On Monday morning, a local farm leader came up with a list of demands, including monetary compensation to the families of the deceased, and the arrest of minister, Ajay Mishra, and his son, Ashish. The first round of negotiations started at 7 am on Monday. After five rounds of talks, an agreement was reached that included ₹45 lakh compensation each to families of the victims, and a government job to a family member, with the lodging of a first information report (FIR), and a fair investigation to ensure action against the accused.
“Initially, farmer groups demanded ₹1 crore for families of all the four deceased farmers, but the government wanted the amount to be ₹25 lakh each. The government officials were also not able to assure the farm leader about the resignation and arrest of Ajay Mishra Teni,” said a senior government official who participated in the negotiations.
Additional chief secretary, Devesh Chaturvedi, announced the ex-gratia of ₹45 lakh, a government job, and a judicial inquiry into the incident by a retired high court judge. An FIR was also lodged under Section 302 (murder charge under the Indian Penal Code), and named Ashish Mishra as the main accused.
The cremation of the victims
Three of the four farmers killed in the Tikunia violence were cremated at their homes on Tuesday. The youngest of the farmers cremated on Tuesday were 18-year-old Lovepreet Singh and Gurvinder Singh. Lovepreet Singh’s father, Satnam Singh, lit his pyre on the path of a paddy field that villagers cleared to cremate the body.
Senior police officials were at the site. A few kilometres away in the Dhaurara area of Lakhimpur Kheri, more than 200 Sikh men assembled on a field where, Nachhatar Singh, 50, was cremated. One of his two sons, Mandeep Singh, a jawan in the Sashastra Seema Bal (SSB) performed the last rites. “We never imagined this kind of an end to my father’s life. He was killed for speaking for the cause of farmers, and we will remember this,” said his son, Mandeep.
In the adjoining Bahraich district, Daljeet Singh was cremated by his 14-year-old son. ASP (rural), Ashok Kumar, and other local officers were present during the cremation. Singh’s wife and 20-year-old daughter also attended the funeral from a distance.
Family members of the fourth victim, 18-year-old Gurvinder Singh, of Mohraniya village in Bahraich, refused to cremate his body alleging he was shot dead and the autopsy hid that fact.
Tikait reached the spot to speak to the family members. The local administration agreed to a second post-mortem by experts. On October 5, Tuesday evening, the state government airlifted a post-mortem experts team to Bahraich, the second post-mortem examination on Gurvinder Singh’s body was done at 4 am, Wednesday, October 6, and at 8 am, the family members cremated the body in their paddy field.
The Supreme Court steps in
On October 4, a petition sent via email was moved before the Allahabad High Court seeking a Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) probe into the case.
But on October 6, the Supreme Court stepped in taking suo moto cognisance of the case. On October 7, a bench headed by Chief Justice of India (CJI) NV Ramana, told senior advocate Garima Prashad, who appeared for the state government that “this is a very unfortunate incident. You tell us how many accused are there and whether they have been arrested or not. You give a status report tomorrow [October 8].”
The police and the investigation
Soon after the incident at around 3.30 pm on October 3, the police was rushed to the spot at Banbirpur village under the Tikunia police station limits of Lakhimpur Kheri district to control the law and order situation.
It took over four hours to control the protesting farmers who went on a rampage after four farmers were mowed down. Initially, the Lucknow range inspector-general (IG) of police, Laxmi Singh, constituted a seven-member investigation committee led by additional superintendent of police (ASP) Kheri, Arun Kumar Singh.
Later, director-general of police (DGP), Mukul Goel, formed another nine-member investigation committee led by deputy inspector-general, Upendra Agarwal. It is this team that is now leading all the police investigations.
The committee is supervising the probe, and the crime branch inspector, Vidyaram Diwaker, has been made the investigating officer of the FIR lodged in connection with the mowing down of four farmers.
Two separate FIRs were registered in connection with the October 3 violence that claimed eight lives in a village under Lakhimpur Kheri’s Tikunia police station limits, UP police public relations officer (PRO) Abhay Nath Tripathi confirmed.
He said the first FIR was registered against Union minister of state (MoS) for home Ajay Kumar Mishra Teni’s son Ashish Mishra alias Monu, and 20 other unidentified people at Lakhimpur Kheri’s Tikunia police station late on Sunday night. He said the FIR was lodged on the complaint of a farmer Jagjit Singh, resident of Nanpara in Bahraich district of UP.
The official said another FIR was lodged against unidentified people under IPC section 302 on the complaint of Sumit Jaiswal with Tikunia police station on Monday. He said the second FIR has no mention of mowing down of farmers and the complainant has accused the culprits among farmers of attacking them and hacking a journalist and three others to death.
Within hours of the Supreme Court rap on October 7, the UP police made the first arrests in the form of two accused, Luvkush Rana and Ashish Pandey, both believed to be associates of Ashish Mishra. The same day, the police stuck a summons notice at the minister’s house asking Ashish Mishra to appear before the police at the crime branch office by 10 am on October 8, which he didn’t do.
The police stuck another notice asking him to appear by 11 am on October 9. Ajay Mishra, on his return from Delhi, at Lucknow airport said that his son had not fled to neighbouring Nepal and was at home. He added that he will appear before the police on October 9. He did, and after a 12-hour-long interrogation, was arrested for not cooperating with the police.
Later, the minister’s close friend and former Union minister Akhilesh Das’s nephew Ankit Das, his driver Shekhar Bharati, and his private gunner, Latif alias Kaale, surfaced during the investigation. They were allegedly present in a black car behind the car of the minister’s son. Das’s driver was arrested on October 12, and a day later, Das and his gunner were arrested after they appeared before the investigation committee on being served notice.
The local court also rejected the bail plea of Ashish Mishra on October 13.
The investigation committee, along with a forensic team, visited the site of the incident twice, and have recovered multiple shreds of evidence, including two missed bullet shells which were also found in one of the vehicles damaged at the spot. However, the bullet wound injuries were not confirmed in the post-mortem examination of all eight deceased.
On Thursday, October 7, the government had appointed a one-member judicial probe by a retired high court judge.
The power of social media
At around 11 pm on Sunday, a 29-second video of an SUV (Mahindra Thar) mowing down farmers and protesters surfaced. By the morning, it was all over social media. It showed the car hitting people in the crowd from behind. By night, clearer and longer videos (up to 50 seconds) surfaced.
Almost all videos were widely circulated on the Twitter handles of Opposition party leaders and also by BJP MP, Varun Gandhi.
All the videos established that three SUVs passed through the crowd at dangerous speeds without decelerating. None of the videos showed any provocation from the protesting crowd.
Despite resistance, the Opposition comes forward
By the evening of Sunday, October 3, almost all top Opposition political leaders — Samajwadi Party chief Akhilesh Yadav, Sanjay Singh of the Aam Aadmi Party, Bahujan Samaj Party’s Satish Mishra, the Trinamool Congress leaders, Punjab CM Charanjit Singh Channi, Chhattisgarh CM Bhupesh Baghel, Pragatisheel Samajwadi Party-Lohia chief Shivpal Yadav — announced that they will go to Lakhimpur Kheri to meet the families of the farmers who were killed.
The Congress national general-secretary and UP in-charge, Priyanka Gandhi Vadra, who left for Delhi on Friday after five day stays in Lucknow, returned to Lucknow on a late evening flight. She attempted to go to Lakhimpur Kheri at night, but was prevented by police, as was MP SC Mishra.
After a series of showdowns with police from Lucknow to Sitapur, Priyanka Gandhi Vadra reached the Lakhimpur border, but the police eventually detained her at the PAC guest house in Sitapur around 3 am. The AAP’s Sanjay Singh too was detained there. The house of Akhilesh Yadav was fully barricaded with riot police on guard. He too was detained on Monday morning for five hours, and so was Shivpal Yadav. After the last cremation that was done on Wednesday, October 6, the state government announced that it would allow political delegations (in groups of five) to Lakhimpur Kheri.
Rahul Gandhi, along with Baghel and Channi, arrived at Lucknow airport, sat on a dharna at the airport (just the way Baghel had held a dharna there the previous day) for police asked him to take police vehicles and not Congress’s private cars. Eventually, the police relented.
“Opposition is doing political tourism and political competition. The Opposition leaders, desperate to regain lost political ground, are solely engaged in political stunts instead of helping people. None of the locals came out to support the movement. The reason is that every person has himself witnessed the series of measures taken by the Yogi government in ensuring fair investigation and justice in the Lakhimpur case”, UP Cabinet minister and government spokesperson, Sidharth Nath Singh, in a statement.
The Opposition continued to show their support, with delegations going one after the other to meet the deceased farmers’ families. First to reach, after the administration permitted, was the AAP’s delegation led by Sanjay Singh. Delhi CM Arvind Kejriwal spoke to a family and promised solidarity with the families. The Congress’s Navjot Singh Sidhu reached and held a maun vrat (a vow of silence) through the night in Lakhimpur Kheri.
“The Yogi government in UP will be remembered in the pages of history as the one that helped killers, rapists, and oppressors and troubling, harassing the victims. People are distressed with the cruel and oppressive regime, and are restive to get rid of this government. The man, the Union MoS, who had set the stage for the incident is still far away from the grip of law. The day the Samajwadi Party national president takes oath as the chief minister of the state, the MoS will go to jail”, said Ram Govind Chaudhary, the leader of Opposition in UP Vidhan Sabha and senior Samajwadi Party leader in a statement.
The farmers’ protest continues
Since October 4, statewide protests by Opposition parties and farmers’ groups continues. Now, the Sanyukta Kisan Morcha has announced a nationwide protest on October 18. Tikait says: “The protests would continue until the MoS [Mishra] is sacked or resigns”.
![Tikait says: “The protests would continue until the MoS [Mishra] is sacked or resigns”. (HT Photo)](https://images.hindustantimes.com/img/2021/10/18/original/179cfe5a-3020-11ec-901b-e0eb6ffe225f_1634567553824.jpg "Tikait says: “The protests would continue until the MoS [Mishra] is sacked or resigns”. (HT Photo)")
Political analyst and former head of the department of political science, Lucknow University, SK Dwivedi believes that the government could have handled the situation better. “The BJP could have had asked the MoS to step down or he should have resigned himself. The police should have had acted against the MoS’s son immediately instead of what it did after the Supreme Court stepped in. Such steps would have had sent a good signal”, he said.
